After imparting his secret, Themistocles asked Aristides to inform

the Council of what he had seen, because, if he himself made the

announcement, it would be regarded with suspicion. #TRUE COURAGE OF

THE GREEKS.# This Aristides did; but even he could not persuade the

Peloponnesians of the truth of his information, and the discussion in

the Council proceeded until a Tenian ship, which deserted from the

enemy, confirmed the tidings in a way that admitted of no doubt It

must necessarily have been a brief space which intervened between the

announcement and its confirmation, but it must have been a time of

intense anxiety to the Athenian commanders. They must have realized

to the full the immensity of the danger to which the fleet would be

exposed did a portion of it sail away through the bay of Eleusis, and

in attempting the passage of the western strait under the impression

that it was open, become engaged with the powerful squadron there at a

distance of many miles from where the main battle must take place.

It is, perhaps, inevitable that the tale of the fierce dispute which

took place at this time in the fleet, and, above all, the continual

application of the term “run away” to the proposals made by the

Peloponnesian section, should convey the impression that the fleet as

a whole was not animated with a courageous determination to face the

danger of the situation. That impression is a false one. Taking the

reliable evidence as it stands, it does not seem just to accuse the

Greeks on board the ships at Salamis of a cowardly spirit.

The question was not one of facing the situation, but of where the

situation should be faced. So soon as they found themselves in a

position where dispute was no longer possible, all that might in the

past have seemed an indication of a vacillating spirit vanished, and

they faced the immensity of the danger with as true a courage as ever

the sailors of any nation faced a foe. It was a moment of exaltation,

which called forth all the best qualities of the Greek. Even Herodotus

must bear tribute to the greatness of the speech which Themistocles

delivered to his men: “Throughout contrasting what was noble with

what was base of all that comes within the range of man’s nature and

constitution, he bade them choose the better part.” And the speech was

not without its effect, even if the account which the poet Æschylus

gives of the feeling in the fleet he somewhat idealized.

“Then the whole fleet advanced, and one mighty cry was heard:

‘On! Sons of the Greeks! Free your fatherland!

Free your children, wives, the homes

Of your ancestral gods, and fathers’ graves.

Ye stand to win or lose your all.’”

No complete description of the various great tactical movements

in the battle has survived. Still, it is possible at the present day,

by dint of putting together the various fragments of information which

may be gathered from the ancient authors, to form a conception of them

which must be very close to the actual truth.

At dawn, on this eventful day, the Greek fleet lay where it had passed

the night, close to Salamis town, probably in the bay to the north of

it. The Persian fleet stretched across the broad eastern entrance of

the strait, in a line running almost due east and west, with Psyttaleia

near or in front of its centre.

From their position the Greeks moved out into the strait, and occupied

that part of it which lay between Salamis town and the Herakleion.

From Plutarch it is learnt that the Herakleion stood where the island

of Salamis is separated from the mainland by a narrow passage. It must

therefore have been on Mount Ægaleos, opposite Salamis town; and the

Greek line was originally formed in the narrow neck of the strait which

exists at that point.

The Persian position is defined by very strong evidence. Not to speak

of that already quoted with regard to the occupation of Psyttaleia,

which occurs in both Herodotus and Æschylus, certain statements of the

latter and of Diodorus render it still more certain. Æschylus describes

how the Persian ships fell foul of one another when they came into the

narrows, a statement which Diodorus makes with still greater precision

when he says that the Persians in their advance at first retained their

order, having plenty of sea-room, but when they came into the strait

they were compelled to withdraw some ships from the line, and fell into

much confusion.

These details show that their position must have been, as already

stated, in the broad part of the strait, just before the narrows begin;

and it will be seen that the strait contracts markedly in breadth so

soon as Kynosura is rounded. #THE GREEK AND PERSIAN ARRAY.# It is

further made clear that they were not in any way round Kynosura, or in

front of Psyttaleia, by the evidence of Æschylus, which shows that the

fleets were not in sight of one another before they moved forward,

though they came in sight of one another very soon after they began to

move.

[Illustration: SALAMIS, LOOKING SOUTH FROM MOUNT ÆGALEOS, WITH THE

ISLAND OF PSYTTALEIA IN THE CENTRE.

1. South-west Coast of Attica.

2. Point near Piræus Harbour.

3. Ægina.

4. Mountaains of Argolis.

5. Kynosura.

[_To face page_ 392.

]

It is unfortunate that Æschylus makes no mention of the positions of

the various contingents in either fleet. Evidence on this point by one

present in the battle would have been of the utmost value. On turning

to Herodotus and Diodorus it is remarkable to find that in so far as

their information overlaps, they are in accord with regard to such

details as they give of the Persian array, but not altogether so with

regard to the order of the Greek line. With respect to the Persian

fleet, they agree in placing the Greek contingent on the left wing,

and the Phœnicians on the right of the line. Diodorus further mentions

that the Cyprians were with the Phœnicians on the right wing, with the

Cilicians, Pamphylians, and Lycians next to them.

In the Greek fleet the Athenians were on the left wing. According

to Herodotus, the Lacedæmonians were on the right; but according to

Diodorus they were on the left, with the Athenians; while the Æginetans

and Megareans were on the right. In this conflict of evidence, it

is almost certain that Herodotus is correct. The fact that the

Lacedæmonian admiral was in command renders it extremely unlikely that

his contingent occupied any but a prominent place in the line; and

certain details of the fight indicate that the Æginetans were in the

immediate neighbourhood of the Athenians. It will thus be seen that the

most prominent contingents on either side were severally opposed to one

another in the battle, the Phœnicians on the Persian right facing the

Athenians on the Greek left, and the Ionian Greeks on the Persian left

facing the Lacedæmonians on the Greek right.

The two fleets seem to have moved forward almost simultaneously. As

the evidence with regard to the nature of their movements is somewhat

complicated, it may be well for the sake of clearness to deal with them

separately.

Before beginning the advance the Persian fleet was drawn up in three

lines; but a totally different formation was adopted when the

movement developed. Describing its appearance as it entered into the

narrow part of the strait, Æschylus speaks of it as coming forward in a

“stream” (ῥεῦμα) which can only refer to some formation in column, or

in something resembling a column. Diodorus supplies the connecting link

between the two formations, when he says that the Persians when they

came into the strait were compelled to withdraw some ships from the

line.

If the chart of the strait at this point be examined it will be seen

that, after passing Psyttaleia and Kynosura, it not only narrows but

turns westward at right angles. The Persian fleet had consequently to

accomplish a difficult manœuvre of a double kind, namely, (1) to reduce

the length of their front; (2) to execute a wheeling movement to the

left, of which their extreme left wing would form the pivot. In so far

as can be judged, what took place is this: their right, and possibly

their centre, having reduced their front, passed through the strait

east of Psyttaleia in some sort of column formation, and then wheeled

to the left, in order to turn the corner of the strait, while their

left wing marked time, as it were, in the strait west of Psyttaleia.

This wing would be hidden from the Greek fleet by the somewhat lofty

rock promontory of Kynosura. But the right wing passing east of

Psyttaleia would come almost immediately into sight of the Greeks, and

would present to them the appearance of the “stream,” which Æschylus

describes.[167]

#THE BATTLE SCENE.#

The scene, as the two great fleets advanced towards one another, must

have been one of the most magnificent that the world has ever beheld.

History can hardly present a parallel of a naval battle on such a

scale as Salamis, and none in which fleets so large have operated

in so comparatively confined a space. More than 2000 years later

the neighbouring Corinthian gulf was destined to be the scene of a

sea-fight which in respect to grandeur and picturesqueness most nearly

compared with Salamis, when Don John of Austria defeated the great

Turkish fleet in those waters which, later on in this very century,

were to be rendered famous by the exploits of the great Athenian

admiral, Phormio. In both these battles East and West met in one

momentous struggle for the command of the Mediterranean—it may perhaps

be said, without exaggeration, for the command of the world; and in

both the East succumbed so completely that the loser never recovered

from his defeat. Impossible as it is fully to realize the scenic effect

of a battle of such ancient date, the records of which are imperfect,

yet the area in which it was fought is so comparatively limited and

so well defined, that the traveller who visits the spot can bring the

scene before his imagination in a way that is impossible in the case

of most of the great fights of ancient history. Would that the

description of it had come down to the modern world from the pen of

him who described the last fight in the great harbour of Syracuse!

It was indeed a theme for that consummate artist in language. The

impression of magnitude which it conveyed to those who were present at

it is evident from the pages of Æschylus, where it is described with

the grand breadth of description due to a battle of giants. But the

historian wants more than he finds therein, and cannot but feel that

Thucydides was born half a century too late.

The evolution which the Persian fleet had to carry out in turning the

corner of the strait would have been difficult under any circumstances.

It was further complicated by the contraction of the sea-room after the

corner was turned, and by the necessity of performing it in face of a

powerful hostile fleet within comparatively short striking-distance.

The result was that the fleet fell into considerable confusion. Both

Æschylus and Diodorus testify to this fact. Diodorus’ account is

peculiarly consistent with the topographical circumstances. He says, as

has been already noticed, that the Persians in their advance at first

retained their order, having plenty of sea-room; but when they came to

the strait, they were compelled to withdraw some ships from the line,

and fell into much confusion.

The two fleets were now advancing rapidly to one another in the

straight channel which runs east from old Salamis town, of which

the breadth is 2000 yards. The actual fairway may be about one mile

in width. How much space in the line was allowed for each trireme

in battle array is not known, but it can hardly have been less than

sixty feet; and, if so, the utmost number of vessels in the front

line of either fleet cannot have exceeded ninety. Both fleets must,

therefore, in this order of advance, have been several lines deep.

There was no room for the employment of sea-tactics other than those

of the most simple kind. The battle must have been, from beginning to

end, a terrific _mêlée_ whose issue would depend on which side could

fight hardest and longest. The circumstances were all in favour of the

smaller fleet. #THE BEGINNING OF THE ENGAGEMENT.# The mere superiority

of the armament of its crews must have gone far to decide the

result, and the superior weight of its individual vessels could not

fail to tell in a combat of this character. With the knowledge born

after the event, it is easy to see that, despite the inferiority of

numbers, the better-armed fleet must have won the day, provided both

fought with equal courage; and the obstinate nature of the battle shows

that, though there may have been cases of cowardice on both sides,

these were the exception and not the rule.

The actual point of contact was, in all probability, north of and

towards the eastern extremity of Kynosura.

From certain details which are given of the fighting, there is strong

reason to suppose that the two fleets, either from accident or from

design, were in somewhat of an _échelon_ formation when the first

contact took place. Æschylus says that the Greek right wing led the

advance, and the remainder came behind. Æschylus also mentions,—and his

evidence on this point is supported by Herodotus,—that a Greek ship

began the battle by attacking a Phœnician vessel. As the Phœnicians

were on the Persian right, this ship must have belonged to the Athenian

contingent, which was on the Greek left; and the only conclusion to be

drawn is that, despite the advanced position of the Greek right, the

first contact took place at the opposite end of their line; in other

words, the Persian right must have been equally in advance of its line.

The wheeling movement, as has been already noticed, had not been a

success; and the Persian vessels which passed through the strait east

of Psyttaleia, and were on the outside of the movement, had got in

front of that part of the fleet which passed through the channel west

of the island, and formed its pivot. It is not difficult to perceive

what happened. This eastern column of vessels had entered the narrow

part of the strait with so extended a front that, when the time came

for the western column to wheel into line with them, it was left with

too little sea-room; confusion resulted, and the advance of the Persian

left wing was delayed. It was no doubt the undue advance of the Persian

right wing which made it possible for the Æginetans later in the

battle to fall upon the flank of the Phœnician contingent, and to deal

the blow which was subsequently regarded as being largely responsible

for the victory won.

Of the picturesque individual details of the fight, but few,

considering its magnitude, have survived; and these are not in all

cases reliable. Yet it is possible, by comparing and collating the

fragmentary accounts of the actual fighting, to form a general idea of

its most striking incidents.

There must have been many interested spectators of the action, Persians

on the mainland and Athenians on Salamis island, whose feelings must

have resembled those with which the Athenian army watched the battle in

the great harbour of Syracuse more than sixty years later.

Not the least interested of these onlookers was the Great King himself.

Surrounded by some of his chief men, he took his seat on the slope

of Mount Ægaleos above the Herakleion, at a point where, as Plutarch

remarks, the strait contracts in width. He must have been stationed

nearly opposite the town of Salamis, among the sparse pinewood which

probably then, as now, covered the slope of the hill.

The Persian fleet seems never to have had the opportunity of recovering

from the confusion into which it had fallen in the course of the

wheeling movement. Plutarch says, moreover, that Themistocles had

reckoned that the early morning wind, which raises somewhat of a sea in

the strait, would have a much greater effect on the Persian vessels,

which stood high in the water, than on the Greek ships. It would tend

to throw them into confusion, and thus expose their sides to the charge

of the hostile ships.[168]

#THE BATTLE.#

Of the form which the confusion took during the battle there is also

a certain amount of evidence. The front ranks of the Persian fleet

seem to have been unduly compressed laterally by the want of sea-room,

and longitudinally by the pressure of the ranks behind them; and the

confusion due to the last of these causes was much increased when the

beaten front ranks were forced back on those in rear. The fleet was,

indeed, too large for the area of operations, and some of the rearmost

ranks apparently, at a period in the battle which is not mentioned,

finding they could take no part in the fighting, backed and retreated

to the broader part of the strait, south of Psyttaleia. The consequence

was, according to Plutarch, that in the actual fighting the Greek fleet

was not outnumbered; and this may well have been the case.

Little is said of the actual mode of attack employed by the Greek

vessels; but, from what is related, it would appear that the Athenians,

at any rate, relying on the structural strength of their ships, sought

to ram the enemy with their bows, or shaved close past them in such

a way as to break the oars on one side, and so render their vessels

unmanageable for the time being; and then made use of the opportunity

to charge them sideways at their weakest point. Boarding must, in many

cases, have been resorted to, for which purpose thirty-six men were

available on the Attic vessels,—eighteen marines, fourteen hoplites,

and four bowmen. It may be conjectured that any superiority which the

Persians possessed in respect to their crews would consist in the

higher efficiency of their bowmen, javelinmen, and such-like. It was,

therefore, greatly to the advantage of the Greeks that the confinement

of the space within which the action was fought rendered it not merely

possible, but necessary, to fight at close quarters. A rather striking

instance of what might have happened in this respect, had the sea-room

been somewhat greater, is related by Herodotus. It occurred

probably towards the end of the battle, when the retreat of many of the

Persian ships had relieved the pressure in the strait. A Samothracian

craft had sunk or waterlogged an Athenian ship, when it was itself

attacked and waterlogged by an Æginetan vessel. Despite its desperate

situation, its crew, which consisted of javelinmen, cleared the decks

of its assailant with their weapons, and took the ship. The whole

incident runs so entirely counter to Herodotus’ marked partiality for

the Athenians, that there is no reason to doubt its genuineness.

The main credit for the victory seems to have been adjudged by the

verdict of contemporaries to the Athenians and Æginetans. Such, at

any rate, is the account of the historian; and the juxtaposition in

the roll of fame of these two Hellenic peoples, who were destined to

play an antagonistic part in the history of the next twenty years,

renders it probable that the verdict of the men of their own time has

been faithfully reported. There is little reason to doubt that their

contingents were next to one another in the Greek line of battle, and

were partners in a brilliant tactical movement against that portion of

the Persian fleet which was regarded as most formidable, the Phœnician

contingent. Herodotus says that while the Athenians pressed hard on

the vessels opposed to them, the Æginetans, presumably on the flank,

assailed these vessels of the Persian fleet as they were driven back.

It is, perhaps, possible to understand what happened on this wing

of the battle. It has been shown that in the course of the advance

the Phœnician contingent on the Persian right must have got in front

of the rest of the line, a mistake which it would be impossible to

correct in a battle fought under circumstances such as those which

prevailed at Salamis. Its flank would then be exposed to attack while

it was assailed in front, and of this the Æginetans seem to have taken

advantage.

It was in the course of this engagement that the Æginetans captured

that vessel of the enemy which had a few weeks before captured their

own scouting vessel on the Thessalian coast.

#THE IONIANS AT SALAMIS.#

Meanwhile the battle in the centre and on the Greek right had

been of a much more even character. It may even be suspected that in

that part the combat was going against the Greeks. The Greek right

was indeed in the same disadvantageous position as the Persian right:

it had advanced in front of the rest of the line, and thus exposed

itself to a flank attack. No details of what actually took place are

extant; but it is evident that the Ionian Greeks who opposed the

Lacedæmonians and other Greek contingents at this part of the line did

not get the worst of it. Herodotus who, as he shows in the account

of the Ionian revolt, had a very low opinion of Ionian courage and

intelligence, was not in the least likely to praise them unless the

praise was notoriously merited. He not merely admits, but says with

some emphasis, that they showed no lack of courage and determination in

the fight. Any effect which Themistocles’ appeal might have had upon

them was certainly not apparent at Salamis. He further remarks that he

knows the names of many of their captains who took Greek vessels, of

whom he will only mention the two Samians, Theomestor, who was made by

the Persians tyrant of Samos for his services, and Phylakos, who was

enrolled on the list of the king’s “benefactors,” and given a grant of

much land. These significant statements make it clear that in the early

part of the battle, at any rate, the Greek right wing had the worst of

the fight. More than that, they suggest a very probable reason for the

somewhat surprising courage and determination with which these Ionians

fought against their kinsmen. Whatever may have been the feelings of

the Ionians in general with regard to their countrymen over sea, their

leaders were attached to the Persians by strong ties of self-interest,

and formed a philo-Medic party in the Greek cities of the Asian coast.

The ruling powers in these cities depended on the support of the

Persian government for the maintenance of their position; and from

their ranks and from those of their followers, in all probability, the

officers, at any rate, of the Ionian contingent were drawn.

The Persian centre also seems to have at first made a stubborn

resistance to the onslaught of the Greeks, and for some time

after the Phœnicians and Cyprians had been defeated and driven back,

the Cilicians, Pamphylians, and Lycians continued to resist, though

assailed by the victorious right wing of the Greeks. But the struggle

was too unequal to last; and they, too, were obliged to retreat.

It is evident that the wave of victory advanced from left to right

along the Greek line, for now the Athenians, probably aided by the

Æginetans, though the latter are not actually mentioned by Diodorus,

joined in the attack on the right wing of the Persian fleet. The fight

cannot have been very prolonged; the Ionian Greeks were obliged to

retire; though, if the silence of history is to be taken as evidence,

they did not suffer irreparable loss either in the battle or in the

retreat. The mere weight of numbers against them rendered further

resistance useless.

The battle must have begun somewhere about seven o’clock in the

morning, for it was after dawn when the Greek fleet put out from the

station it had occupied during the night. It came to an end in the

afternoon, after some seven or eight hours’ fighting, it would seem.

It was presumably in this last battle on the Persian left that

Artemisia, that queen of Halikarnassos whose praise Herodotus has

already sung, performed the remarkable exploit reported by the

historian. There is a somewhat grave irony about the way in which he

tells the tale, as though, in spite of his admiration for this lady,

he were pointing a moral for those who might regard even the bravest

of her sex as rather uncertain allies amid the excitement of a pitched

battle. When the Persian fleet was already in disorder, evidently

towards the close of the fight,[169] an Attic vessel pursued her ship.

As she could not extricate herself in any ordinary fashion, owing to

her friends being in the way, she stood not on ceremony, but made

a way through her friends by purposely sinking a Kalyndian vessel.

#THE MASSACRE ON PSYTTALEIA.# The captain of the Attic ship, unaware

that he had a woman to deal with, naturally supposed that he had made

a mistake, and had been pursuing a friend instead of a foe, and so

allowed the brave but unscrupulous Amazon to escape. He had reason

to regret his mistake; for the Athenians, either because they regarded

her as a unique acquisition, or her action in commanding a ship against

them as a unique piece of impudence, had offered a large reward to any

captain who should capture her. Nor, if the whole tale be true, was

the Athenian captain the most distinguished victim of the deception

caused by her audacity. Xerxes was a spectator of the incident, so

Herodotus says, and imagined that the ship she sank was one of the

enemy’s vessels. As the rest of his fleet had by this time taken to

flight, the incident, by its apparently strong contrast with the bitter

circumstances of the moment, called from him the lament, “My men have

become women, and my women men.”

It is probable that the Greek pursuit was not carried far, if at all,

beyond the channels on either side of Psyttaleia. No information on

the subject is given by any of the historians, but the fact that

the Persian fleet left the troops on Psyttaleia, some of whom were

persons of note, to their fate, indicates that they were not allowed

to retire as far as that point unharassed by the victorious Greeks.

It may be that each contingent considered it another’s business to

rescue these unfortunates, but in any case the two channels must have

been in undisputed possession of the Greeks when Aristides carried out

what cannot have been the least bloody operation in a battle where

the losses on both sides must have been very great. He had, while the

battle was in progress, been stationed on what Herodotus calls “the

promontory of Salamis,” which would seem to mean that his men had lined

the shore of the strait from Salamis town eastward to the extremity of

Kynosura, with a view to rendering assistance to such vessels or their

crews as might be cast up there during the battle. When the strait was

clear of the enemies’ ships, he collected his men, and transported them

in boats to Psyttaleia, to attack the Persian garrison of the island.

The slaughter must have been grim and great. Only those were spared

from whom a heavy ransom might be expected.

No reliable statement survives of the losses in men sustained

by either side. Those of the Persians must have been very large, and

those of the Greeks in a battle of such a nature, and so prolonged,

cannot have been otherwise than severe. Probably the Persian losses

were never even approximately known, and, in the confusion of the time,

those of the Greeks never accurately ascertained. Herodotus says that

many of the Greeks from the disabled vessels escaped by swimming to

Salamis, and that the total loss on the Greek side was not very great;

but the very circumstances of the battle make the latter statement

hardly credible. Among the Persian killed was Ariamnes, the admiral in

command, a son of Darius and brother of Xerxes. He seems to have fallen

early in the fight; many other prominent Persians shared his fate.

Their defeat was not due to cowardice. Herodotus expressly says that

they fought better than at Artemisium.

The losses in ships are stated by Diodorus to have been forty on the

Greek side, while the Persians lost two hundred, not counting those

which were captured with their crews. It is very possible that these

numbers represent something like the truth.

After the battle each of the fleets retired to its temporary base of

operations, the Persian to Phaleron, the Greek to Salamis.

In each of the two passages in which he mentions the retiring places

of the fleets, Herodotus makes incidental statements of considerable

historical importance. He describes the Persian retirement as having

been “to Phaleron, to the protection of their land-army.” Perhaps he

means that this was merely a part of their land-forces, the other

having been despatched, as he has already stated, ◆H. viii. 70, _ad

fin._◆ on the night preceding the battle, on its march to the Isthmus.

But if that be not the case, it would seem as if the march had been

countermanded, and the army brought back in consequence of a change of

plan.

Speaking of the return of the Greek fleet to Salamis, Herodotus makes

it plain that the Greeks were inclined rather to under-estimate than to

over-estimate their success in the battle.

#THE CORINTHIANS AT SALAMIS.#

They expected that the king would make a second attack upon them with

the ships which still remained to him. To those possessed of knowledge

after the event, it may seem strange that the Greeks should ever

have entertained this feeling. It would appear as if they had been

so stunned by the immensity of the struggle in which they had been

engaged, that they were unable rightly to assess the enormous moral

damage they had inflicted on the foe.

The details of the battle which are recoverable at the present day

indicate clearly that to the Athenians and Æginetans the Greeks owed

their victory; and to them indeed their contemporaries awarded the palm.

Of the behaviour of the other individual contingents nothing can be

said to be known. Herodotus does, indeed, relate a story, which he

expressly states to be of Athenian origin, to the effect that the

Corinthians under Adeimantos retired from the Greek line, and began to

make their way to the western strait, but were stopped by a mysterious

messenger, who announced the victory of the Greeks; whereupon the

would-be runaways returned to Salamis. Herodotus evidently places

no credence in the tale; nor need the modern world do so. He says,

moreover, that its truth was denied by all the other Greeks.

If it had any foundation whatever in fact, it may be that the

Corinthian squadron was detached to observe the narrows near the island

of St George with a view to guarding against attack from the rear by

the Persian contingent which was known to be watching the western

strait. As the tale stands, it can only serve as a remarkable example

of the extent to which misrepresentation could be carried in Greece

under the impulse of the bitter enmities of a later time.

A defeat of such magnitude sustained in the presence of Xerxes himself

could not but lead to fierce dissensions among the various contingents

of the Persian fleet. The Phœnicians, that trading people which Persia

had always treated with marked favour at the expense of their rivals,

the Ionian Greeks, had to justify to their master the fact that they

had been the first to retire, whereas the Ionians had resisted to the

last. If Herodotus is to be believed, ◆H. viii. 90; D. xi. 19.◆ they

adopted the bold line of accusing the Greek contingents of cowardice in

the fight. This charge, said to have been made while the fight was in

progress, was immediately refuted by the gallantry of the Samothracian

crew in capturing the Æginetan ship which had disabled their vessel.

The accusers were executed; and, if Diodorus’ story be true, the

Phœnicians were so alarmed at the prospect of what might happen to them

from the angry Xerxes that, after retiring to Phaleron in the

afternoon, they fled in a body under cover of night to the Asian coast.

As, however, no trace of such a detail is found in any other historian,

and their statements are wholly inconsistent with it, it cannot be

regarded as serious history.

It was not, perhaps, until after the war was over that the Greeks

acquired sufficient perspective to gauge aright the full significance

of their victory on this day. It absolutely destroyed the very

foundation of the great strategical plan on which the invasion had

been conducted—the combined action of the fleet and army.[170]

Never, perhaps, has the influence of sea-power been more strikingly

exemplified in warfare than in the total reverse of circumstances which

resulted from Salamis. Up to this time the naval power of Persia had

been supreme in the Ægean and Eastern Mediterranean for many years

past; and the attempt which the Ionians had made to break it at Ladé

had by the completeness of its failure merely served to establish it on

a firmer basis. But from Salamis onward the decline was rapid, and the

Persian navy was never again as an unaided unit formidable in the Ægean.

Salamis was also decisive of the war in which it was fought. Having

lost the command of the sea, the Persians could not possibly maintain,

in a poor country such as Greece, the overwhelming land force with

which they had invaded it. The mere question of supplies rendered the

rapid withdrawal of the major part of it an imperative necessity.

#MARATHON, SALAMIS, AND PLATÆA.# Persia did not, indeed, give up the

struggle, but she was obliged to continue it with a force so

reduced in numbers that the Greeks were able to match it in fighting,

if not in actual numerical strength. Salamis was the turning-point of

the war. Platæa was the consummation of Salamis. After Salamis Southern

Greece was safe. Mardonius might have maintained himself for some time

in the rich lands of Bœotia, he might even have attempted to include

that region within the imperial frontier, but he could not have carried

on a sustained campaign in the poor districts to the south of the line

of Kithæron-Parnes line. The salvation of the North was won at Platæa.

In consideration of the circumstances, is it presumptuous to hazard the

opinion that Sir Edward Creasy was not wholly justified in preferring

Marathon to Salamis as one of the “fifteen decisive battles of the

World”? The decisive battles exemplified in his book are, with the

exception of Marathon, chosen apparently as marking the time at

which the tide of affairs of world-wide moment definitely turned to

an uninterrupted ebb or flow. But they are in nearly every case the

outcome of a chain of events extending, in many instances, over a

series of preceding years. If the first link in the chain is to be

regarded as decisive of the whole series of events, then, perhaps, the

choice of Marathon may be justified; but, on the same principle of

choice, the decisive battles of the world would have in many cases to

be sought for in comparatively obscure engagements. But if, as is the

case with most of the instances Sir Edward Creasy adduces, the supreme

decisive moment in a great situation is to be taken, then Salamis, not

Marathon, is to be chosen in the great Persian war of the first quarter

of the fifth century. The actual records of the time conspicuously fail

to support the view that from Marathon onward the tide of the struggle

with Persia flowed uninterruptedly in favour of the Greeks.

CHAPTER X.

FROM SALAMIS TO PLATÆA.

After the defeat of Salamis, the position of the whole Persian

expedition was one of extreme danger. The command of the sea had been

lost for the time being, and the chances of its recovery were remote.

A fleet which had been so severely handled was not likely to fight so

well on a second occasion, even if it were possible to induce it to

assume once more the offensive. It was infinitely more probable that

the Greeks, who had hitherto acted almost entirely on the defensive,

would now realize that they were in a position to become the attacking

party. The question of the moment seemed to be how the Persian

naval force could make good its retreat without exposing itself to

further, and, it might be, irreparable, disaster. Xerxes, with the

characteristic selfishness of a despot, seems to have concerned himself

with making his own escape secure, and to have merely troubled himself

about that of the fleet in so far as his own safety was dependent

upon it. He had reason to doubt the loyalty of the Ionian contingent.

It had, indeed, fought well in the battle; but the reverse which had

been experienced would inevitably tend to quicken whatever element of

disloyalty it contained. His main anxiety was for the bridge across the

Hellespont.

The account which Herodotus gives of the measures which he took to

give the Greeks the impression that he meditated a second attack, and

to hide his intention to retreat, is of so strange a character that it

has been largely discredited by modern authorities. #♠PERSIAN COUNCIL OF

WAR.# ◆H. viii. 97.◆ “He set to work,” says the historian, “to carry

a mole across to Salamis, and he tied Phœnician merchant-ships

together, to act as pontoons, and as a defence. He further prepared

for battle, as though about to fight a second sea-fight.” These

preparations, so it is said, deceived all his own people save

Mardonius, who, knowing his master well, was not under any illusion as

to his real intentions.[171]

♠ “PERSAIN COUNCIL” replaced with “PERSIAN COUNCIL”

◆H. viii. 100.◆

The evident alarm and despair with which Xerxes regarded the

situation rendered Mardonius uneasy. An adviser whose counsels had

ended in disaster,—and he was mainly responsible for persuading the

king to undertake the great expedition,—might well be anxious as to

the consequences which the failure might have for himself. Whether

Herodotus had any real authority for his account of the advice which

he represents Mardonius to have given Xerxes at this time, may perhaps

be suspected; but the main outlines of it are worth quoting, even if

they only reproduce what some contemporary Greek imagined that advice

to have been. He is represented, in the first place, as seeking to

minimize the disaster by arguing that it had only fallen upon one

branch of the service, and that the land-army was in no wise impaired

in efficiency by what had happened. If he did actually use this

argument, he can only have used it because he thought that it was a

sufficiently good one for the man to whom he was speaking. He had

himself commanded the expedition of 492; and though on a much smaller

scale, that venture had been brought to a premature conclusion by

the storm which wrecked his fleet off Mount Athos. Mardonius was the

last man who ought to have deceived himself as to the significance of

the disaster at Salamis. Two courses, he said, were still open,—either

to march with the whole army against the Peloponnese, or for Xerxes to

withdraw with the major part of the land-forces, and leave him three

hundred thousand men wherewith to complete the conquest of Greece. Such

is the advice as reported. Whether a march on Peloponnese was possible

at this time cannot be said, since the state of the Persian supplies is

not known. In any case, Xerxes had no stomach for such a venture, and

adopted the alternative suggestion, which offered a greater chance of

security to his all-important self. ◆H. viii 102.◆ Moreover, this was

the view of the matter which the astute Artemisia, whom he called into

counsel, put before him.[172]

It must of necessity remain a matter for doubt whether Mardonius ever

gave such advice. The retirement of the fleet to the Asian coast would

give the Greeks the naval command of their side of the Ægean, and, that

being so, the real line of communications was lost, and the alternative

route by land along the North Ægean would be, even if it could be

regarded as effective, liable to be cut by an attack from the sea. On

the other hand, it is possible that he reckoned that he might maintain

himself for some months, even for a year, on the food-resources of

Thessaly and Bœotia; and in that space of time much might happen to

reverse the ill-fortune of the moment. Besides all this, even if the

conquest of Greece as a whole could not be effected, there did remain

the possibility of advancing the Persian frontier south from Macedonia

even as far as Kithæron, and of robbing Greece of her richest lands.

That the Greeks feared something of this kind is shown by their

subsequent advance to Platæa. That move was so inconsistent with the

whole plan on which they had conducted the campaign on land, that it

can only be accounted for on the hypothesis that they were actuated by

some such fear.

#THEMISTOCLES AFTER SALAMIS.#

But there were also political considerations of the very highest

importance which could not but affect the decision of Xerxes and the

Persian authorities. The acknowledgment of complete failure such as

would have been apparent had the whole force withdrawn _en masse_ to

Asia, must have shaken to its very foundations the great composite

empire which was held together by the strong hand and the prestige of

success. But could Xerxes on his return report that a force had been

left to complete the reduction of Greece, the magnitude of the disaster

which had fallen upon him might be concealed, until, at any rate, he

was himself in a position to take measures to provide against any

possible commotion which might be caused when the varied population of

the empire came to realize the extent of the failure which had resulted

in an expedition in which it had put forth all its strength. Whatever

the advice of Mardonius may have been, these considerations must have

been present with Xerxes and his council when they met to discuss the

course to be adopted in view of what had happened at Salamis. Herodotus

shows, from the words he attributes to Artemisia, that he was not

oblivious to the wider possibilities of the situation.[173]

His account of the events which immediately resulted from Xerxes’

decision is complicated historically by the reappearance of

Themistocles on the stage of his history. The historian does not

attempt to conceal the prominence of that great man at Salamis; but in

the description of the actual fighting his name is only incidentally

mentioned, and personal details of him are conspicuous by their

absence. But the tradition of the events succeeding the battle

contained several ugly stories, some of them, indeed, capable of

diverse interpretation, but all of them capable of being interpreted

to Themistocles’ discredit. These the historian has inserted in his

narrative, with the result that he has introduced into it an element

which must excite suspicion, and which makes it very difficult to

disentangle that in it which is reliable from that which is not so.

◆H. viii. 107.◆

On the very night, it is said, after Xerxes’ decision had been

taken, the commanders of the Persian fleet put out with all speed for

the Hellespont, with orders to guard the bridge across the strait

for the king’s return. It is not, perhaps, easy to see why so much

store should be set by the bridge. The main point, it might have been

imagined, would be to defend the Hellespont. Xerxes’ personal safety

and his passage of the strait would in that case have been equally well

secured.

One incident of the voyage is described which is intended to

demonstrate the nervous state to which the Persian seamen had been

reduced by their defeat. Near a place called Zoster, which is supposed

to have been situated on the Attic coast the Persians mistook certain

rocks for enemies’ ships, and fled “a long distance” before they

discovered their mistake. The object of the story is evidently to

emphasize the dramatic contrast between the confidence which preceded

the battle and the depression which succeeded it.

The next day was well advanced before the Greeks discovered the flight.

Seeing the land-army in its old position, they supposed the Persian

fleet to be still at Phaleron, which bay would be hidden from their

position in the strait by the high promontory of the Piræus; and,

under this impression, they prepared to meet a second attack. It is

remarkable, but quite evident, that the Greeks under-estimated alike

the moral and material damage they had inflicted on the enemy. They

show none of the jubilation which follows a decisive victory; and it

must be concluded that the fight was more fierce and more stubborn

on the part of the vanquished than any Greek historian has described

it to have been. Then, says Herodotus, when they discovered that the

fleet had sailed away, they started in pursuit, and proceeded as

far as Andros without catching sight of it. This is not surprising,

considering that it had, in all probability, twelve hours’ start. The

statement that the fleet went as far as Andros, or even ventured to

leave Salamis at this time, has been regarded with suspicion by some

historians. #QUESTIONS OF THE HELLESPONT BRIDGE.# It is argued that

with the land-army of the Persians still in Attica, the Greeks could

not have ventured to withdraw their fleet from the strait, and

have exposed the refugees on Salamis to attack.

But is it necessarily to be assumed that the Greeks did not leave any

vessels behind to provide against such a contingency? It may even be

doubted whether, after the withdrawal of the fleet, the Persian army

had any means whatever at its disposal for the passage of the strait.

The short voyage to Andros was, no doubt, of the nature of a

reconnaissance. It was manifestly important to know whether the enemy’s

ships had definitely departed from Greek waters.

◆H. viii. 108.◆

On arriving at Andros a Council of War was held as to the plan of

operations for the immediate future. Themistocles’ view was that the

pursuit should be continued, and that the bridge over the Hellespont

should be destroyed. Eurybiades urged, on the other hand, that if the

Persian army were thus cut off from its sole avenue of retreat, it

must remain in Europe, and would be compelled to develop a policy of

great activity for the mere purpose of obtaining supplies. The result

of this, so he thought, would be the gradual subjection of the land,

and the destruction of the annual produce of Greece. He therefore urged

that the way of escape be left open. With him, as might be expected,

the other Peloponnesian commanders agreed.

Themistocles, finding he could not prevail upon the Greeks as a body to

adopt his plan, then addressed the Athenians, who were, so Herodotus

says, eager to sail at once to the Hellespont, and ready to take the

risk of so doing upon their own shoulders. His address is given in what

profess to be the actual words of it. So far from urging them to follow

out their desires, he emphatically dissuades them from this course;

thus, apparently, completely reversing the advice he had first given.

The change of counsel is plainly explicable on the ground that what he

considered to be the best course for the fleet as a whole would, he

thought, be risky and unadvisable for half the fleet to attempt But

that is very far from being the interpretation which Herodotus puts

upon it. ◆H. viii. 109.◆ “This,” says the historian, “he said with the

intention of establishing a claim upon the Persian, in order that, in

case any disaster should befall him at the hands of the Athenians,

he might have a place of retreat. ◆H. viii. 110.◆ In saying this,

Themistocles dissembled, but the Athenians believed him: for inasmuch

as he had, previous to the recent events, been regarded as a clever

man, and his cleverness and wisdom had been clearly confirmed by what

had lately happened, they were ready to listen to what he said.”

There can be little doubt that this tale is part of that unveracious

Themistocles legend which Herodotus has woven into those traditions of

the great war which he has followed in composing his history. Never is

the animus against Themistocles more clearly shown; and in no instance

is the absolute improbability of any single part of the legend more

strikingly displayed. The tale is refuted by its context. Before

starting for Andros, the Greeks had been deceived as to the movements

of the Persian fleet, by observing the land-army in its original

position. And yet, arrived at Andros, Themistocles is represented as

actually proposing to cross the Ægean and cut off the retreat of an

army whose retreat had not begun, and whose intention to retreat could

not, if the story is to stand as it is written, have been known to

him. It is inconceivable that any sane commander could possibly have

advised the Greeks to attempt operations on the Asian coast at this

stage of the war.[174] Again, the object proposed was manifestly futile.

What good could have been attained by breaking down the bridge, had

not a sufficient force been left behind to maintain the command of the

Hellespont against the Persian fleet? Could not a strait no broader

than many parts of the lower Danube have been easily crossed by means

of ship and boat transport? If the Greek fleet were once entangled in

that region, could the possibility the Persian fleet or of part of it

doubling back to the European coast be ignored? #THE “THEMISTOCLES”

TRADITION.# Above all, did the Greek fleet know whither the enemy

had gone? A very few hours’ start would have taken them far out of

sight. They had had that start; and all that the Greeks at Andros could

have known with certainty was that there were no ships between that

place and Piræus.

It cannot be doubted that this passage in Herodotus is one of a series

of excerpts from a history of Themistocles composed by a hostile

political party. The tale of the Council at Andros merely serves the

purpose of a peg whereon to found the charge of trickery or treachery

which immediately follows it. The verisimilitude of the story is to be

further supported by knowledge after the event. Themistocles did in

after-time take refuge with the Persians. Was he, however, likely at

the very crowning moment of his life to have foreseen the eventuality

of his being obliged to do so?

The story is so corrupt that it is most difficult to select from it

the element of truth which it may contain. It is possible that a

reconnaissance was made as far as Andros, and that it was decided

to go no farther. It is in the highest degree doubtful whether the

tale of Themistocles’ communication with Xerxes at this time had any

real foundation. The proposal to break down the bridge has all the

appearance of a _rechauffé_ served up with a new sauce, of the story

which connected the hero of the last great battle, Marathon, with the

proposal to break the Danube bridge during Darius’ Scythian expedition.

It has been suggested that he gave the information in all honesty,

because he wished to get Xerxes and his army out of the way. No doubt

he and every other Greek did entertain that wish; but it is impossible

to see how the message, in the form in which it was sent, could further

its fulfilment. ◆H. viii. 110.◆ The last words of the message, “Now

depart at your leisure,” singularly fail to accord with the conjectural

explanation of Themistocles’ alleged conduct. There is, at the same

time, every possibility that Themistocles did, after the retreat of

the land-army had definitely begun, urge the advisability of offensive

operations on the Asian coast at some period not long after

the battle; and it is probable that such operations would have been

eminently effective. But in this Themistocles legend these proposals

have been purposely antedated, in order to adduce them as evidence

of the truth of Themistocles’ suspicious communications with Xerxes,

before the latter started on his return journey.

It is quite possible, too, that the rejection of these proposals led

to Themistocles’ resignation of the command of the Athenian fleet. It

is difficult to account for it in any other way. High as party feeling

ran at Athens, the Athenian citizen showed a distinct preference for

entrusting his life amid the chances and changes of war to men of

known capacity, and the Strategia was less affected by the storms of

political contention than the other high departments of government.

Tacked on to this last tale is the story of the siege of Andros. The

Greek fleet, it is said, after renouncing all idea of further pursuit,

laid siege to Andros; “For the Andrians first among the islanders

refused to pay money on Themistocles’ demand; and when Themistocles put

forward the argument that the Athenians had come, having with them two

great gods, Persuasion and Force, so that they would certainly have

to pay, they answered that Athens was naturally great and prosperous,

being blest with such excellent gods, but, as far as the Andrians were

concerned, their land was poor as poor could be, and two unprofitable

gods, Poverty and Inability, left not their island, but ever abode

there; and being cursed with these gods, they were not going to pay the

money; for never could even the power of Athens be more powerful than

their own inability.” So the siege began.

Themistocles’ demands were not confined to Andros. Large sums were

extorted, under threat of siege, from the islanders, of whom the

Karystians and Parians are named, because they had medized in the

recent war.

The whole language of the story suggests in the plainest possible way

that Themistocles exacted these contributions for his own benefit.

#RETREAT OF THE PERSIAN ARMY.# That such demands were made is

no doubt the case. The bitterness of the feeling against the medized

Greeks might well suggest that, as a punishment for their crime in

taking up arms against their fellow-countrymen, they should be forced

to contribute to the expenses of the defender of that which they had

attacked; but to represent Themistocles as employing this fleet for his

own selfish ends is plainly a colouring given to the story by the same

hand that invented the previous tale of his relations with Xerxes.

Whatever may be the origin of the Themistocles legend in Herodotus

taken as a whole, this particular section of it was almost certainly

the creation of the aristocratic party, which was, be it said to its

credit, the friend in after days of the subject allies, and therefore,

apart from other political considerations of a more general kind,

not likely to depict in a favourable light the first instance of the

imposition of the island tribute, nor to deal sparingly with the

man who might, with some show of plausibility, be regarded as its

originator.

Another important question which suggests itself is whether this demand

on Andros and these exactions from Karystos and Paros were made at this

time, within a few days of Salamis. It is extremely unlikely that the

Greek fleet, with only half of the danger at home averted, should have

ventured at this moment to spend time over the siege of one of the

island towns. The whole incident of the exactions looks as if it ought

to be attributed to a somewhat later date.

◆H. viii. 113.◆

The retreat of the Persian army began a few days after the naval

battle. Mardonius accompanied it because, so Herodotus says, he wished

to escort the king. The campaigning season also was far advanced, and

he thought it would be better to winter in Thessaly. His real motive

in retiring so far north,—a motive Herodotus could hardly appreciate,

even if he ever heard it mentioned,—would be to shorten the line of

communications, especially for commissariat purposes. He had now no

fleet upon which to depend. Moreover, Thessaly was a rich country,

whose local supplies would go far towards satisfying the temporary

wants of his army. There he selected the men who were to remain

with him for the next year’s campaign. He seems to have chosen the best

troops in the huge and motley host, Persians, Medes, Sakæ, Bactrians

and Indians; and Xerxes made no objection. And then the rest of the

helpless throng departed on its long march round the North Ægean, to

carry to Asia a terrible tale of suffering of which but few details

have survived in the Greek historians. According to Herodotus, three

hundred thousand men remained with Mardonius. It is commonly supposed

that this number is largely exaggerated; but unless there is a

proportionate exaggeration in the numbers of the Greek army present at

Platæa, the force which the Persians opposed to them there can hardly

have been less than two hundred and fifty thousand in number. Mardonius

probably retained with him nearly the whole of the really effective

land-force of the original expedition.

◆H. viii. 115.◆

That part of the army which continued its retreat from Thessaly took

forty-five days to reach the Hellespont. The misery of that time must

have been unspeakable, and but few out of the many ever set foot

again on Asian soil. The realities of a six weeks’ march of four

hundred miles, in the case of a large force wholly unprovided with

commissariat, must have been horrible beyond description. Starving

themselves, they spread famine by their ravages wherever they went. In

many places no food was obtainable, and then they ate the very grass

by the way and the leaves of the trees. Dysentery was the inevitable

result. The sick who fell by the road were left to the care of the

natives; and, knowing the nature of those wild Thracian tribes of

the North Ægean, it is not difficult to imagine that their fate must

have been pitiable in the extreme. At last the survivors reached the

Hellespont, to find that the bridge had been carried away in a storm;

but they were transported to Abydos in boats. Not even then were their

misfortunes over. Many of the starving multitude perished from giving

undue satisfaction to their ravenous hunger.

◆H. viii. 119.◆

Herodotus, though he mentions two accounts of the matter, is of opinion

that Xerxes accompanied the army all through its retreat. #AN INTERVAL

IN THE WAR.# He rejects a tale to the effect that on arriving

at Eion, at the mouth of the Strymon, the king went the rest of the

way by sea on a Phœnician ship, and was only saved from perishing in

a northern gale by the devotion of certain Persians who accompanied

him, and who sacrificed themselves in order to lighten the ship. Apart

from the tale of devotion, the rejected version is manifestly the more

probable. Not to speak of the horrors of the land-march, the king’s

personal safety may well have been imperilled in the midst of an army

which had undergone and was undergoing the sufferings of his. To

Hydarnes was committed the conduct of the remainder of the retreat.

◆H. viii. 121.◆

The siege of Andros turned out a failure. Karystos was attacked and its

territory ravaged; and then a return was made to Salamis. It is evident

that the Greeks themselves were at this time under the impression that

the war in Europe was over, in so far as they were concerned; and

eagerness of the Athenian section to carry the war into Asia, which

Herodotus has antedated, may be ascribed to this time. The news that

Mardonius had remained in Thessaly, with evident intent to renew the

war next year, can hardly have reached Athens until several weeks at

earliest from the time at which the retreat began.

Under this mistaken impression they began to wind up the skein of past

events, and after their patriotic victory to discuss who had deserved

best of their common fatherland. The gods had been very good to them,

much better, perhaps, than they themselves realized; and it was to them

that their remembrance first turned. To Delphi was dedicated a tenth of

the spoils. ◆H. viii. 123.◆ After dividing the rest of the plunder, the

Greeks sailed to the Isthmus to decide by vote who of all of them had

rendered the greatest services to his country in the recent war. The

result was unfortunate. Each general having two votes gave the first

to himself, and the majority gave the second to Themistocles. Under

the circumstances they thought it best to forego the decision; and the

various contingents departed home to their cities.

In spite of this the admiration of Themistocles burst forth, and

that in a most unexpected quarter. He went to Sparta, where such honour

was paid him as never had been previously paid to any foreigner, and

never was again paid up to Herodotus’ own day.

There are certain elements in the political situation at this

time which make it possible that party feeling ran high among the

Athenians during the period which now ensued. ◆Plat. Them. [Arist.]

Athen. Pol.◆ The Areopagus, which still continued to represent all

that was exclusively aristocratic in Athens and Attica, had played

a considerable part in the measures which had been taken for the

public safety; and if the recently discovered Polity of Athens,

which is attributed to Aristotle, is to be believed, it had gained

considerable reputation thereby. On the other hand, the man of the

hour was Themistocles; and he led political interests directly opposed

to those which the venerable council represented. It may be that

Themistocles’ resignation of the Strategia was not wholly unconnected

with these struggles. He does not appear in history as a man likely

to under-estimate his own personal worth; and the discovery that, in

the turmoil of party strife, the world generally seemed to set a lower

value upon it, may have given bitter offence to his pride. Herodotus

gives no detail of these political events; ◆H. viii. 125.◆ though his

introduction to a story which he evidently inserts because it contained

such a _bon-mot_ as he dearly loved, shows that an attack was made on

Themistocles immediately after his return from Sparta. Timodemos of

Aphidnæ was the name of the assailant. He reproached Themistocles with

having taken to himself an honour due to his country; and, apparently,

thinking the remark an effective one, repeated it on more than one

occasion.[175] Herodotus, who never discovered a lack of ready wit to

be one of Themistocles’ defects, takes evident pleasure in recording

the crushing retort: “The thing stands thus,” said he; “had I been from

Belbina, I should not have been thus honoured by the Spartans, nor

would you have been, good sir, even had you been from Athens.”

#THE WAR IN SICILY.#

This is the last of the series of events in Greece which can be

attributed to the year 480, but before proceeding to recount the

history of the following year, it is necessary to recur briefly to

what had meanwhile taken place in Sicily. The brevity of the reference

is not due to the unimportance of the events themselves, but to the

meagreness of the surviving records of them. Herodotus dismisses the

subject in a few words; and the scheme of history which Diodorus had

proposed to himself rendered it impossible for him to devote much space

to them, despite the fact that this year was a most decisive one for

the history of his native land.

After the departure of the Spartan and Athenian ambassadors, Gelo of

Syracuse had been left alone to face that great storm which Persia

had stirred up in the West with the evident intention of preventing

the Sicilian and Italian Greek from taking part in the defence of the

mother country. It was more than fortunate for the Sicilians that at

this most critical moment of their history, such power as they could

put forward was under the control of one strong hand. The tyrant, or

tyrant city, was indeed at all times in Sicilian history necessary to

the salvation of the Greeks, face to face as they were with the great

Carthaginian power in the west of the island, supported by a central

base but a few miles distant across a narrow sea.

There is no question that the Carthaginian preparations were on a

very large scale, ◆Diod. xi 20.◆ though the numbers given by Diodorus

are certainly exaggerated. In her struggle with Rome, more than two

centuries later, Carthage, though in all probability more powerful

than she was in 480, could not muster aught resembling the strength

which the Sicilian historian attributes to her on this occasion. He

states the number of the land forces to have been 300,000. The fleet,

he says, consisted of 2000 warships, together with 3000 transports. It

is manifestly useless to attempt what, in the absence of independent

records, can be no more than a guess as to the actual numbers. All that

can be with safety assumed is that they were very large. The name of

the commander was Hamilcar.

The gods of the winds were hardly less kind to the Greeks of Sicily

than they were to their fellow-countrymen at home. A storm

overtook the expedition in the Libyan sea, and the vessels conveying

the horses and chariots were lost. Hamilcar, however, conducted the

remainder in safety to Panormos. He had no anxiety as to the result now

that he had safely transported the bulk of his forces across the sea.

Doubtless he reckoned on having to deal with a Sicily such as Sicily

had been before the recent rise of Gelo’s power, in which the great

force at his disposal would have been able to crush the Greek cities in

detail.

From Panormos, after repairing, in so far as possible, the damage

suffered in the storm, he marched his army along the coast to Himera,

the fleet keeping in touch with it meanwhile. His method of advance

was consequently similar to that adopted by the Persians in their

march round the Ægean. Arrived at Himera, he formed two camps, one

for the army and one for the fleet. The arrangement of these camps is

interesting, as showing that in the west, as in the east, the Greeks

had to deal with a foe which, whatever his defects, was both capable

and experienced in the organization of large expeditions over sea. The

warships were drawn up on shore and surrounded by a stockade and deep

ditch. The other camp was contiguous to the naval one, but ran inland

to the summit of the neighbouring heights, to the west of the city of

Himera, and facing it. Hamilcar thus secured his communications with

his commissariat base,—the fleet. The provisions which he had brought

with him he landed, and then despatched the empty transports to Libya

and Sardinia to fetch a further supply. His plan was evidently not

to attempt to assault the town on all sides. The loss of his cavalry

would make it difficult for him to advance far from his sea-base; and,

besides, he had to expect an attack from a relieving force. Having

completed the fortification of his position, he took some of the best

of his soldiers and advanced against the town, whose garrison came

out to meet him, afraid, no doubt, of his establishing siege works in

the immediate neighbourhood of their wall. It had, however, to retire

with severe loss, a disaster which brought the Himerans to a state of

despair. #GELO MARCHES TO RESCUE HIMERA.# But even thus early in

the campaign the town was not wholly dependent on its own resources.

Thero, tyrant of Akragas, who was content to play a subordinate part to

Gelo in Sicilian politics, was either present in it, or,—for Diodorus’

language is capable of two interpretations,—in its neighbourhood, with

a force whose numbers are not mentioned. Alarmed at the situation, and

evidently not in sufficient strength to take the offensive against

the Carthaginians, he sent an urgent message to Gelo to come with all

speed. Gelo was ready, and the fact of his being so suggests that the

defence against the invader was being conducted on a definite plan.

Syracuse had evidently been chosen as the base of operations. Its

communications with southern Sicily are both shorter and more easy

than with the north. If the attack took place on the south, which was

probably known to be unlikely, the central force at Syracuse would be

within striking distance. It would seem, therefore, that Thero’s corps

had been sent from the south to the north, where the attack was more

likely to be made, to act as an army of observation, and to hold the

enemy until Gelo could appear with the main army. The plan was a sound

one.

◆Diod. xi. 21.◆

The army with which Gelo started from Syracuse is stated to have

numbered 50,000 infantry and 5000 cavalry. He made a rapid march, and

his arrival infused new courage into the Himerans. He did not enter the

city, but fortified a camp of his own outside it, and started active

operations by sending out all the cavalry to cut off Carthaginian

stragglers. Hamilcar must have been at this moment in a position of

great disadvantage, owing to the loss of his horses in the storm. The

number of the enemy captured by this raid of cavalry is stated to have

been 10,000; it appears, in any case, to have been large.

But Gelo had no idea of confining himself to a passive defence of

the place, knowing, in all probability, that the enemy might expect

reinforcements, whereas the Siciliot forces present at Himera

represented the utmost effort of which Sicily was capable. The Himerans

had walled up their city gates. He caused them to be opened once more,

and infused a spirit of cheerful confidence into the whole Greek

army. In all likelihood this change of feeling was largely due to

the comparative inactivity to which Hamilcar was reduced in face of

the large force of Syracusan cavalry against which, owing to his own

loss, he had not any similar force to match. Something of the kind

is indicated by the fact that he sent a message to Selinus, urgently

demanding assistance in this arm. Unluckily for him, the return

messenger announcing its despatch fell into the hands of Gelo’s men.

That able commander had been for some time devising plans by which he

might not merely defeat, but utterly destroy, the invading army. The

intercepting of this message suggested to him a means of doing so. He

had apparently already made up his mind that an attack on the naval

camp, and the destruction of the ships within it, must be part of his

programme. The disclosure made by the message that the Carthaginians

were expecting cavalry reinforcements suggested to him the design of

substituting cavalry of his own for the looked-for horsemen of Selinus,

so as to obtain access to the naval stockade. It was a bold plan, but

it was entirely successful. Not the least fortunate circumstance about

the matter was that on the very day on which the cavalry were expected

Hamilcar was going to offer a great sacrifice; and this was apparently

known to Gelo. The Syracusan horsemen were sent under cover of night,

and after making a circuit,—the Greek camp being probably east of the

town,—arrived at the naval camp from the western side just about dawn,

and were admitted by the guards under the impression that they were the

Selinuntian horse. Once inside the stockade, they proceeded immediately

to kill Hamilcar and to set fire to the ships.

But this was only part of the whole plan. Watchers had been placed

upon the heights, with orders to announce by signal the arrival of

the cavalry within the stockade. On receiving the signal, Gelo, with

the whole of the rest of his army, began an assault on the other

Carthaginian camp, which was, as has been seen, situated on the heights

above the naval encampment. #THE BATTLE OF HIMERA.# The Carthaginian

commanders, unaware at first of what had been going on below them, led

out their men to meet this attack, and for some time the battle

was stubborn and bloody, both sides fighting with great bravery. The

increase of the conflagration in the camp below, however, at last

attracted their notice, and the arrival of a message announcing the

death of Hamilcar completed the dismay of the Carthaginians and fired

the courage of the Greeks. The former gave way, pursued by the Greeks,

to whom orders were given to take no prisoners. Though the slaughter

was a terrible one, it is hardly possible to accept Diodorus’ statement

that one hundred and fifty thousand perished. Some of the survivors

fled to a bare height, where they defied all direct attack; but they

were compelled in the end to capitulate, owing to there being no water

obtainable on the position.

It was a brilliant and crushing victory for the Sicilian Greeks, so

complete and so lasting in its results, that it marked the beginning of

an era of peace and prosperity destined to last for many years.

Diodorus, with a pardonable pride in the exploits of his

fellow-countrymen, draws a comparison between the victory at Himera and

that which the Greeks won at Platæa in the following year. There is

one important point of contrast which he does not mention, but which

will be appreciated by those who are acquainted with the stories of

those two great battles. The resistance which the Carthaginian troops

offered to the Greek hoplite in close fighting was evidently much

more stubborn than that offered by the Persian infantry. It was not

a question of courage; it was not a question of physique. In these

two respects the Persian was probably superior to the Greek, and not

inferior to any contemporary race. The difference was in panoply. The

African and Spaniard wore defensive armour, such as the Oriental never

learnt to use because the climate of the lands wherein his campaigns

were mostly fought rendered the burden of the weight of it too grievous

to be borne. The resistance offered to the Eastern conqueror took the

form of legions of cavalry and mobile bodies of light-armed infantry,

and to meet them he had to employ forces of a similar kind. Against

such, in a land of infinite distances like Western Asia, an

army of hoplites might, if the enemy adopted tactics suitable to the

nature of his force and to the nature of the country, be reduced to

impotence, if not brought to destruction. The campaigns of Alexander

are supposed to have proved the opposite to be the case. Those who take

that view of them seem to forget that the enemy opposed to him adopted

tactics wholly unsuited to the nature of their army, and fought the

very pitched battles which they should have scrupulously avoided. Had

the Persians in that war employed the tactics which three centuries

later led to Carrhæ, the campaigns of Alexander might have ended in

the neighbourhood of the Amanus. The military history of the East and

West in the centuries preceding the Christian era is ruled by one

great limitation. East could not gain any decisive advantage over West

in the West, nor West over East in the East, unless the enemy made a

fundamental error in tactics.

The resources of the East in light cavalry were out of all proportion

to any number of this arm which the West could, even with the utmost

effort, put into the field; and such a force, properly employed, must

have always made the immense plains of the Euphrates or of Media

untraversable to a Western army. In like manner, against the heavy

infantry of the West, accompanied by a proper quota of light-armed

troops, the light infantry of the East were helpless in regions where

it could not be supported by its cavalry; and west of Taurus, such

regions were the rule and not the exception. The eastern Taurus was,

indeed, the military frontier between East and West.

This generalization may appear to be somewhat wide; but the results of

every single battle in which East and West came into conflict support

it. There are no exceptions. Such cases as appear to be so afford the

strongest evidence of the truth of it: in every one of them the loser

committed some glaring tactical error which robbed him of the essential

advantages which the very nature of things afforded him.

#GELO MAKES PEACE WITH CARTHAGE.#

As a pure example of the military art, Himera did more credit to

the victors than did Platæa. It was won by reason of a well-devised

plan; Platæa, in spite of an ill-devised one. In its results it was

hardly less decisive, though these results were not of a character

to attract the attention of the modern world so forcibly as the

after-effects of Platæa.

Its actual date in 480 is uncertain. Diodorus assigns it to the same

day as Thermopylæ. Unfortunately, the historians of this period display

so marked a tendency to discover such coincidences of date that any

statement of this kind cannot be regarded as reliable.

◆Diod. xi. 24.◆

Of all the great expedition, only twenty warships escaped from

Himera, and these, over-laden with fugitives, perished in a storm on

the way home. The news of the disaster was carried to Carthage by a

few survivors who managed to reach the coast in a small boat. The

consternation which it excited was naturally terrible; and for some

time the Carthaginians lived in daily expectation of the appearance of

Gelo’s fleet on the African coast.

In order, if possible, to ward off the fatal catastrophe which,

under the circumstances, must have resulted from such an invasion,

ambassadors were despatched to Syracuse with all speed to make the best

terms they could. In point of fact, the alarm on this particular score

was groundless. Gelo seems to have been content to leave well alone,

and to reap the fruits of his victory in Sicily, without attempting

conquest over-sea. It is obvious that, had he been otherwise inclined,

the history of the world might have been changed by the destruction or

permanent crippling of the Carthaginian power.

The disposal of the large number of prisoners which had been taken

was first provided for. They were distributed among the Sicilian

towns. Akragas got more than her due share, because the fugitives

from Himera, fleeing inland to the mountains, had ultimately arrived

in the territory of that city, where they were captured in large

numbers. The magnificence of the temples and public works of that

great town was largely due to the employment of these prisoners on

their construction.[176] That page of history which records

Gelo’s reception of the Carthaginian embassy is obscure. The facts

are sufficiently plain. He demanded extraordinarily moderate terms:

a war subsidy of two thousand talents of silver, and the expenses of

the construction of two temples. But why such moderation was observed

by him at a time when he could without doubt have brought about the

withdrawal of all the Punic settlements in Sicily, is not explained.

Nor, in the silence of history, can any adequate motive for his action

be suggested, unless he took the view that he would best secure a

lasting peace by such a policy. The Carthaginians attributed his

treatment of them to the influence of his wife Demarete; and it is

recorded to the credit of a people whose good points are not, from the

force of circumstances, brought into prominence in Greek and Latin

history, that they showed their gratitude to her by the free gift of

one hundred talents of gold. Gelo, having exhausted sentiment in the

late negotiations, exercised the persuasion of a husband, ◆Head. Hist.

Num sub Syracuse.◆ and appropriated the treasure to the establishment

of that magnificent silver coinage which has excited the admiration of

later ages.

Thus ended this brief but important chapter in Sicilian history. The

Greek of Greece sought to ignore its significance; his posterity but

half remembered it; and the great historian of the latter half of

the century accepted the maimed tradition as he found it. But to the

historical inquirer of the present day, who has all the evidence before

him, this episode must appear not the least glorious part of the great

struggle which saved western civilization.

◆H. viii. 126.◆

Among the troops who shared in the retreat of Xerxes’ army to the

Hellespont, was a body of sixty thousand men selected from those which

Mardonius had chosen. They were under the command of Artabazos, about

whom and whose family Herodotus seems to have had special facilities

for acquiring information. #ARTABAZOS BESIEGES POTIDÆA.# It may be

suspected that this intimacy was due to the successive tenure in

after-time of the Daskylian satrapy in Northen Asia Minor by

Artabazos, his son, and grandson. The reason for his accompanying

the march to the Hellespont was, so Herodotus says, that he might

escort the king. It is more probable that the main motive lay in the

organization of the new main line of communications along the North

Ægean, with reference especially to commissariat. On his return

from the Hellespont, he found the line threatened at one point by a

rising against the Persian power, which had broken out in Pallene,

the westernmost of the peninsulas of Chalkidike, and in the country

immediately north of it, about the town of Olynthos. The desperate

state of the king’s army in its passage by their territory had

evidently given the citizens of this region the idea that the days of

the Persian dominion in Europe were numbered, and that thus they might

with safety throw off the yoke without further delay. The insurrection,

though confined to this small region, threatened what was now the

sole line of communications. It was imperative to crush it forthwith.

This Artabazos set to work to do in the course of his return march to

Thessaly. He laid siege to Potidæa, the chief town of Pallene, which

stood on the narrow isthmus which connected the peninsula with the

mainland, and, having walls from sea to sea, prevented all access

to the peninsula itself to any force unaccompanied by a fleet. Its

position was consequently one of great strength. Olynthos was by no

means so strongly placed, but was of still greater importance to

Artabazos, as more directly blocking the great highway from Asia. This

latter town he took apparently without much trouble, and massacred its

Bottiæan inhabitants at a lake hard by. He handed over the place to the

Chalkidian Greeks, under the command of a native of Torone.

He then proceeded to blockade Potidæa on the side of the mainland,

that towards the peninsula being inaccessible to him. The siege was

marked by one of those attempted acts of treachery which too often blot

the records of Greek courage. The commander of the contingent from

one of the Pallenian towns, Skione, entered into communication with

the Persian by means of written messages concealed in the feathers

of an arrow which was shot to a place previously agreed upon.

Unfortunately for the success of the plan, Artabazos on one occasion

missed the mark, and hit one of the besieged in the shoulder. His

friends gathering round him discovered the writing wrapped round the

shaft, and carried it to the generals. The Skionian commander was,

however, spared for the time being, lest the stigma of treachery should

attach to his fellow-citizens.

The siege had lasted three months when an extraordinary ebb of the sea

took place, rendering it possible for the besiegers to make their way

on either side of the town towards Pallene. This phenomenon was not

rare at Potidæa, so Herodotus says, but on this occasion it occurred on

a larger scale than usual. It was probably due to one of those volcanic

disturbances for which the Ægean has been ever noted. Had the Persians

taken immediate advantage of the opportunity thus offered, they might

have got into the town, but, probably distrusting the nature of what

must have seemed to them a very extraordinary occurrence, they were

late in venturing upon the passage, and the returning flow came upon

them when but two-thirds of the way across. Those who could not swim

were drowned, and those who could were destroyed by the garrison, who

put out in boats for that purpose. How many lives were lost history

does not say, but the disaster was sufficiently great to make Artabazos

throw up the siege. The capture of Olynthos had made the road fairly

secure.

◆H. viii. 130.◆

After its hurried retreat from the European shore the Persian fleet

had made its way to the Hellespont, where it had awaited the arrival

of the retreating army, and had ferried it over to Asia. Nothing could

show more clearly the futility of the alleged proposal of Themistocles

to break down the Hellespont bridge. From Abydos it sailed to Kyme,

where part of it wintered, while the remainder proceeded to Samos.

On the appearance of spring the whole fleet assembled at the latter

place, not, says Herodotus, with any intention of crossing the Ægean

from thence, but to provide against possible revolt in Ionia. #GREEK

COMMANDERS IN 479.# The position was well chosen for that purpose; but,

more than this, the island lay at the eastern end of the shortest

and most used passage of the Ægean, where an almost continuous line of

islands stretches from Sunium to the Asian coast, affording protection

against northern and southern gales. If the Greek fleet should sail

to Asia, this was the route it would most probably take. Herodotus

says they did not expect its coming, because there had been no pursuit

after the retreat from Salamis. It may be apprehended that the Persian

commanders were better able than Herodotus to gauge the significance of

that fact, and that the expectations which the historian attributes to

them are of his own suggestion.

It does not appear as if there were any formed intention of resuming

the offensive in the Western Ægean in order to give support to

Mardonius whenever he should re-open the campaign, though, if Herodotus

is to be believed, ◆H. viii. 130, _ad fin._◆ plans of attack of some

kind were discussed. Whatever they may have been, they were not put

into immediate operation; and the appearance of the Greek fleet on the

Asian coast later in the year completely altered the situation.

The approach of spring warned the Greeks that they must make

preparations to meet the impending attack of Mardonius. With

incomprehensible but characteristic dilatoriness, no immediate effort

was made to collect the army, though a fleet of a hundred and ten ships

gathered at Ægina under a new commander, the Spartan Leutychides.

Moreover, Themistocles no longer commanded the Athenian contingent, his

place being taken by Xanthippos. Possible reasons for this remarkable

and important change have been already suggested. Of the actual reasons

nothing is known.

There was, moreover, in this year, a change not merely in the

_personnel_, but also in the system of command which prevailed during

the previous year in the Athenian contingent. The Athenian army had

played no part at Thermopylæ, and at Salamis it had acted, in so far

as it did act, in immediate conjunction with the fleet. It had been,

therefore, possible to place both arms of the service under the control

of one supreme commander,—Themistocles. In 479, however, it was evident

that the altered circumstances of the war would necessitate the

employment by Athens of a considerable force on land, acting quite

independently of the fleet. It would be impossible, therefore, for

one man to command both; and a separate command on land was given to

Aristides, another member of the College of Ten Strategi. He may or may

not have been placed under the general control of Xanthippos. As events

turned out, he must have exercised a practically independent command.

An arrangement of this kind would, had the circumstances arisen but a

few years earlier, have raised considerable constitutional difficulty;

but between 490 and 480 the whole system of military and naval control

had been completely remodelled.

At the time of Marathon, the supreme command was in the hands of one

of the archons, with the title of Polemarch, and the ten strategi were

subordinate to him, being merely the commanders of the contingents

furnished by the ten Kleisthenic tribes, and also forming a council

of war. In the course of the official year 487–486, the method of lot

was introduced into the election of the nine archons, of whom the

polemarch was one. The most thoroughgoing democrat at Athens, being,

as a citizen, liable to service in war, would hardly fail to see the

undesirability of entrusting his life to a general chosen by this

method. That special form of fatalism would have few attractions for

him. Thus the constitutional change with regard to the archonship

necessitated some change in the arrangements of the military and naval

commands. The polemarch was no longer commander-in-chief. That office

was vested in the members of the board of strategi, which henceforth

had absolute control of military and naval affairs. As strategi, all of

the ten were in a position of equality; and it is probable that each

was allotted his own special department of administration, either on

election, or by mutual arrangement between the members of the elected

board. A board so constituted might work well in times of peace, but

in time of war such a divided command could only lead to confusion and

inefficiency. #APPEAL FOR AND FROM IONIAN GREEKS.# The people therefore

reserved to itself the power of allotting special commands to strategi

of its own choice, or even of appointing one member of the board a

generalissimo (στρατηγός αὐτοκράτωρ).

It was under this constitutional arrangement that the mode of command

adopted in 479 was possible.

It was while the fleet was at Ægina that the Greeks received the first

direct appeal for aid from the Ionian Greeks. Doubtless the populations

of the cities along the Asian coast were much stirred at this time by

the disaster which had befallen the great expedition. That the Ionian

contingent had shared in those disasters was a consideration which

would affect but slightly the sentiments of the mass of the Ionian

population; since, as has been already pointed out, that contingent

represented merely the dominant philomedic minorities in the various

Ionian towns. With the unbroken power of Persia to back them, those

minorities could not be assailed with any hope of success; but now

that that power was shaken, it might seem that the time had arrived

for action. In Chios, at any rate, a plot was formed to murder the

local tyrant Strattis. It miscarried, and six of the chief conspirators

fled for their lives across the Ægean, where they made an appeal,

first to Sparta, and then to the fleet at Ægina, to strike a blow for

the liberty of their countrymen beyond the sea. Herodotus’ silence as

to their reception at Sparta is eloquent; but his description of the

effect of their appeal on the fleet is one of the most remarkable,

and probably one of the most misinterpreted passages in his history,

◆H. viii. 132.◆ “The refugees, with difficulty, induced the fleet to

go as far as Delos; all beyond was to the Greeks a land of danger,

for they knew not even how it lay, and fancied it all to be full of

the enemy’s troops. As for Samos, it seemed to them as far off as the

Pillars of Hercules. So it befell that the Persians were afraid to sail

westward of Samos, and the Greeks dare not go eastward of Delos, though

the Chians entreated them so to do. So fear stood between them and

protected them.”

This passage, even in its manifest rhetorical exaggeration, is

interesting. The evident intention of the historian is to mark the fact

that the mutual feelings of the two adversaries had entered upon a

second stage.

He has spared no pains to draw a striking contrast between the

exaggerated confidence prevailing on the Persian side up to the time of

Salamis, and the corresponding lack of it among the Greeks. The balance

of fear had been heavy against his countrymen. But now, at the opening

of the campaign of 479, he is equally anxious to show that the scale

had altered, and was now in equilibrium. With the dramatic instinct

of the Greek, he wishes to indicate in one striking sentence that the

turning-point in the tragedy has been reached. He was telling, as he

well knew, the most exciting story in the history of the world up to

his own time, and he may be pardoned, perhaps, if in his anxiety to

emphasize its climax he has employed the language of exaggeration.

But when it becomes a question of determining the extent of the

exaggeration, it may be suggested that there is perhaps less

exaggeration in his statement than in the criticisms which have been

passed upon it. May it not be that the eastern shore of the Ægean

was to the European Greek of 480 a far less known region than might,

without reflection, be assumed? Twenty years had passed since the

outbreak of the Ionian revolt. Was not the attitude of Athens and

Eretria in the first year of it peculiarly calculated to render

communications between the two shores difficult and rare? The trade of

the Ionian cities must have practically ceased during the seven years

of the struggle; and, in any case, Persia, in her bitter resentment at

the interference of the two states of European Greece, was not likely

to encourage the visits of traders from the other side of the sea.

Every avenue of trade in the Asian waters must have been unsafe to the

Greek, not merely on account of the possible presence of the Persian

fleet, but by reason of the swarm of privateers which the south coast

of West Asia was ever ready to produce. #THE SILENT ÆGEAN.# And when

the revolt was over, was it probable that the Persians would allow

the Greek trader free access to information with regard to the plans

of the expeditions of 492 and 490, or, amid the access of bitterness

which arose from the failure of the latter year, with regard to the

preparations made for a great revenge? If intercourse did

continue, how does it arise that the Greeks were ignorant of the

magnitude and real intent of the expedition of 480, up to within a

few months of its arrival in Greece? The Ionian must have known long

before. Why did he not tell the Greek trader, if that trader was a

frequent visitor to his ports? After-ages do not realize the nature

of the blow dealt to trade by a prolonged period of war, even if the

active warlike operations be not continuous. To take examples from

the history of England. Those who read the story of the Seven Years’

War mark with pride the absolute predominance which Great Britain had

gained upon the seas by the year 1761. And yet, in that very year,

eight hundred and twelve English trading ships were captured by the

enemy,—no small fraction of the British trading fleet of those days.

During the wars of the Napoleonic period when, after Trafalgar, Britain

for many years commanded the sea, the English Channel, the greatest

trade highway in the world, was almost as deserted as that Northern

Ocean which Tacitus describes.

Is it not possible, at least, that Herodotus has in his mind a state

of things lasting for many years in the Ægean similar to that which

prevailed in the Channel in the first years of the nineteenth century?

He may have exaggerated the feelings of the Greek sailors at this time;

but who at the present day can say to what length of exaggeration he

has gone?

CHAPTER XI.

THE CAMPAIGN OF PLATÆA.

◆H. viii. 131.◆

While these events were occurring in Middle Greece, Mardonius, in the

far North, was preparing to move. It is said that before starting

he despatched an envoy to make inquiries of the oracles of Northern

Greece, at Lebadeia, Abæ, and Mount Ptoon, on what subject Herodotus is

unable to say with certainty—on the circumstances of the time, he is

inclined to think.

◆H. viii. 136.◆

A much more important envoy was despatched to Athens in the person

of Alexander, the son of Amyntas, a member of the royal house of

Macedonia, who was connected with the Persians by family ties, and with

the Athenians by his having held for them the position of Proxenos, or

consular agent, in his own country.

It may fairly be doubted whether Herodotus got the tale of Alexander’s

mission from an Athenian or from a Macedonian source, or whether he

combined information derived from both. ◆H. viii. 136.◆ The reference

to the character of the Athenian people has, on the one hand, a strong

Attic flavour about it, H. viii. 137 _et seqq_. while the knowledge of

the Macedonian royal family displayed here and elsewhere in his work

suggests that Herodotus acquired his information on the spot in the

course of a visit to that country.[177]

[Illustration: PLAIN OF THEBES AND MOUNT KITHAERON.

_From Sketch by E. Lear._]

1. Kithæron (about 15 miles).

2. Ridge between Parasopia and Plain of Thebes.

3. Thebes.

[_To face page_ 436.

]

This tale might, consequently, be derived from Macedonia. #MARDONIUS

AND ATHENS.# This supposition is, however, rendered unlikely, owing

to the excessively mistaken forecast which Alexander is described to

have made of forthcoming events; and its Attic origin is the

more probable. It is needless to say that that does not make for the

veracity of a story whose evident intention is, like that of so many

of the stories of this time, to bring into relief the self-denying

patriotism of Athens. Yet, in spite of this, the story in itself is

credible enough.

◆H. viii. 136.◆

Mardonius, so the tale runs, had made up his mind that if he could win

over the Athenians to the Persian side he would thereby deprive the

forces opposed to him of a people both numerous and brave, who were,

moreover, mainly responsible for the disaster of the previous year. By

this means he hoped to gain once more command of the sea, and expected

to be infinitely superior to the enemy on land. This design, Herodotus

thinks, was probably suggested to him by the oracles he had recently

consulted.

The most remarkable reference, so far, is to the recovery of the

command of the sea. No one could better estimate than Mardonius the

full significance of the loss of that command. He must have known well

that, unless it were recovered, he could at best obtain but a partial

measure of success. Anything of the nature of a prolonged campaign to

the southward of Bœotia would be, on the mere question of commissariat,

impossible; and a brief campaign was not to be looked for. A foe

which had been formidable with the courage of despair was likely to

be more formidable when animated with the courage of a hope following

despair. He had, no doubt, accumulated during the winter in Thessaly

as large a commissariat as possible; but it is beyond conception that

he could have greatly increased the necessarily limited supplies

obtainable locally by transport along that route of four hundred

miles whose use had only been contemplated a month or two before, and

whose organization must necessarily have been of the most hurried

description. He must win Athens over, or modify his plans.

To her accordingly was offered a free pardon for the past on the

part of the Great King, the enjoyment of her existing lands, and any

accession of territory she liked. Nor did Alexander the envoy fail to

point out to the Athenians the contrast between such a prospect and

their actual state as the people who had suffered most from the war.

◆H. viii. 141.◆

The news of Alexander’s visit to Athens, and of its object, created

considerable alarm at Sparta. An embassy was despatched with all speed

to counteract the possible ill-effects of his proposals. This embassy

was actually present when Alexander spoke; for the latter had been

kept waiting for several days before he had been allowed to bring his

business before the assembly. The astute Athenians had made up their

minds to use Alexander as a lever wherewith to move the sluggish

Sparta to action. They do not seem to have had any intention whatever

of taking Mardonius’ message into consideration. When Alexander had

done speaking, the Spartan ambassadors addressed the assembly. They

urged that it would be gross desertion on the part of the Athenians

to renounce their share in a war which had been provoked by them, and

by them alone. Turning to more material matters, they promised to

alleviate the sufferings of the Athenians by undertaking the support of

the non-effective part of the population.

The Athenian answer to Mardonius’ message was as firm as their

determination: “So long as the sun runs his course in the heavens, we

will never make terms with Xerxes.”

The answer to the Lacedæmonians as reported by Herodotus is, in

sentiment and language alike, one of the finest passages in Greek prose.

“The fear of the Lacedæmonians lest we should make terms with the

barbarians is, humanly speaking, very natural. And yet, knowing well,

as you do, the spirit of Athens—that there is not in the wide world

gold sufficient nor land so exceeding fair and good that we would

accept it as the price of our own defection and of the enslavement

of Hellas,—your fear, we think, does you but small credit. There are

many powerful considerations which would forbid our so acting, even

had we the will to do so. #ATHENS AND SPARTA.# First and foremost is

the burning and destruction of the images and temples of the gods,

which we, so far from making terms with the doers of these deeds,

must of necessity avenge to the full. Secondly, there is that tie of

blood and language which binds the Greek world together, our common

share in our religious foundations and sacrifices, our community of

manners—things which it would disgrace the Athenians to betray. Know

this, if you did not before know it, that so long as a single Athenian

survives, we will never make terms with Xerxes. We admire your kindly

thought for us, in that, homeless as we are, you are willing to support

our families. That kindness on your part is complete, but we will

endure as we are, without burdening you.

“But now, these things being so, send forth your army with all speed,

for we imagine that the invasion of our land by the barbarian will not

be long deferred, so soon as he hears our message refusing compliance

with his demands. Ere, then, he enters Attica, there is time for us to

meet him in Bœotia.”

And so the Spartan ambassadors went home.

The Athenians evidently hoped that they would be able to save their

land from the devastation of the previous year by persuading the allies

to meet the enemy in Bœotia.

Their hopes were natural, but they were not destined to be fulfilled;

and, if by Bœotia the Bœotian plain was meant, it was fortunate they

remained unfulfilled.

On receipt of the answer from Athens Mardonius started on his march

from Thessaly without delay. The feudal families of that region had

thoroughly espoused the Persian cause, and their attitude, as well as

that of the Bœotians, shows that the dominant section in the two great

territories of the North had definitely made up their minds that,

whatever the fate of the South might be, those regions were to become

part of the Persian Empire. ◆H. ix. 2.◆ The Theban advice to Mardonius

to remain in Bœotian territory and seek to conquer Greece by corrupting

the leading men of its various states, shows that the medization of

the ruling powers in Bœotia was not merely a passive attitude. One

thing, however, Mardonius had made up his mind to do—to capture Athens

a second time. Herodotus attributes the intention to mere vanity, but

any one or all of three practical reasons made its acquisition of

importance to him. Its recapture might induce Xerxes from his base

on the Asian coast to attempt to regain the command of the sea. Its

possession might bring pressure to bear on the Athenian authorities,

and aid his design of detaching that people from the forces of

resistance. Finally, in case he intended to advance on the Isthmus, the

possession of the Acropolis would protect his left flank. He occupied

Athens without striking a blow, the population having been removed, as

in the previous year, to Salamis. Having occupied it, he reopened the

negotiations which Alexander had attempted but a short time before.

The result was the same. The spirit of the people was shown by their

stoning to death Lykides, a member of the council, for merely proposing

that the message should be communicated to the Assembly. Even his wife

and children were murdered in a similar way by the Athenian women at

Salamis.

◆H. ix. 6.◆

This second withdrawal to Salamis comes somewhat as a surprise in

Herodotus’ narrative, for his account of the visit of the Spartan

embassy to Athens at the time of Alexander’s presence there makes it

appear that an understanding had been arrived at by which Athens might

be spared a second invasion. The explanation comes later. “So long as

the Athenians expected that an army would come from Peloponnese to help

them, they remained in Attica.” But when the presence of the enemy in

Bœotia was announced, and it became impossible to hope that help from

the South could arrive in time, they retired to Salamis, as they had

done the year before. They also despatched an embassy to Sparta to

protest against the delay.

The strong appeal to patriotism made in their last communication to

the Lacedæmonian embassy had failed to impress a people whose very

institutions and training rendered them incapable of forming a real

conception of the true spirit of a pan-Hellenic policy. Their stern

discipline, moreover, was only too well calculated to render them mere

tools of those set over them; and the delay in the present instance

was probably due to the policy of an inner ring of the government at

Sparta. The records of the time afford no certain clue to the motives

lying behind that policy. #ATHENIAN EMBASSY AT SPARTA.# It is possible

that it aimed at forcing the hand of the Athenians, and compelling

them to take part in the defence of the Isthmus.

◆H. ix. 7.◆

Sparta having failed to listen to persuasion, Athens had recourse,

as on previous occasions, to threats. The Spartans were told that if

Athens found herself deserted, she would seek her salvation in her

own way; it was more than hinted that Mardonius’ offer might become

a question of practical politics. The Spartan excuse for delay was

similar to that urged for the desertion of Thermopylæ, the celebration

of a festival. The story of the reception of the ambassadors is one

of the strangest in the strange history of this time. They bitterly

reproached the Lacedæmonians with their conduct. They put the very

worst construction on the Spartan policy, which had, they said,

inflicted on patriotism an amount of suffering which it dare not have

inflicted on uncertain fidelity. It is probable that the reproach was,

in so far as the Spartan authorities were concerned, well deserved.

From the language used by the Athenians it is evident that they

believed that the Spartans had agreed to join in operations in Bœotia

merely in order to keep Athens from medizing before the wall at the

Isthmus was absolutely completed.[178]

That was the construction Athens put upon their conduct at this time;

but it is probable that the more correct interpretation of their

extraordinary policy is that by delaying they would be able to transfer

the defence to the wall, and could, under any circumstances, rely on

the devotion of Athens to the common cause.

Turning to the question of the future war policy, the Athenian

ambassadors proposed that, as Bœotia had been lost, the enemy should be

met in Attica; and they mentioned the Thriasian plain between Eleusis

and Mount Ægaleos as admirably designed for a field of battle. [It must

be remembered that this recommendation was made at a time when the

Greeks were without experience of the effectiveness of the Persian

cavalry on ground suited to its operations.]

The Ephors deferred their answer to the following day; from that to the

next, and so on, until ten days had been wasted. They were waiting,

says Herodotus, for the completion of the wall. They were, too,

waiting, no doubt, until events in the North developed sufficiently to

make it impossible for Athens to propose any other line of defence.

This unsatisfactory state of things was brought to an end, so Herodotus

says, by a warning addressed to the Ephors by Chileos, a Tegean, who

had great influence in Sparta. He pointed out that if Athens joined the

Persian, wall or no wall, the doors of the Peloponnese would be opened

wide. Herodotus evidently supposed that until this moment such an idea

had never occurred to the Spartan authorities, despite the experiences

of Artemisium and Salamis in the previous year. In all probability,

what really influenced these authorities was the fact that an able man,

whose opinion they valued, was not so sure as they themselves were,

that Athenian loyalty would endure much longer the severe test to which

it was being put.

Their next act was a very strange one. Without saying a word to the

ambassadors, they despatched under cover of night a force of five

thousand Spartans, each of whom was accompanied by seven helots. There

were, therefore, forty thousand in all. The number of light-armed

helots is remarkable, certainly above the usual quota allotted to a

force of five thousand heavy-armed.[179]

#SECRET DESPATCH OF SPARTAN ARMY.#

In constituting this force, the unusual number of light-armed in

the army which it would have to meet would naturally be taken into

consideration. The circumstances of population in the Spartan

territories, moreover, were such that any unusual increase in the

numbers employed on any expedition would be supplied by the increase

in this branch of the service. The commander of this large force was

Pausanias. Kleombrotos had been in command at the Isthmus in the

previous year, but had died shortly after bringing back his army

thence.[180] It must have been prepared for departure for some time

past No such force could start on short notice.[181]

The ambassadors, knowing nothing of this sudden march, and weary of

the continual procrastination, were prepared to leave Sparta on the

following morning. Before the deception was discovered the Athenian

delegates actually stated that, in consequence of Sparta’s attitude,

Athens would make terms with Persia, and, more than that, would

accompany the Persians in their invasion. Truly the Spartan government

policy had very nearly brought Greece to ruin.

The surprise of the indignant envoys may then be imagined when they

were told in answer by the Ephors that they had every reason to believe

that their army was, by that time, at Orestheion on its march

against “the strangers,” as they called the barbarians. Orestheion was

in the small plain of Asea, S.S.E. of the Arcadian plain, where one of

the great roads from Sparta northward met the main road coming from

Messenia to the Arcadian plain. The fact that they took this route is

interesting, because it almost certainly indicates that they wished to

avoid Argos, from which, as will be seen, a certain amount of trouble

was to be expected.

Thus the truth came out; and the envoys started without delay in

pursuit of this phantom army, accompanied by five thousand picked

hoplites of the Periœki.

The truth about the attitude of Argos at this time is rendered

uncertain by the fact that, after the war was over, the patriot Greeks

regarded not merely those races which had medized, but also those

who had not taken part with them, as having been enemies of their

fatherland. That of itself would give rise to a number of traditions

of doubtful credibility with respect to the attitude of such neutrals.

Nevertheless, the attitude of Argos was highly suspicious, and there

is no doubt that it was firmly believed in after-time that she had had

traitorous relations with Persia.

◆H. ix. 12.◆

Herodotus asserts that the Argives sent a messenger about this time to

Mardonius, who was in Athens, saying that they were unable to carry out

the promise that they had made to him to stop the Spartan army on its

march northwards. This tale is to a certain extent supported by the

fact that the Spartans, instead of adopting the shorter route north by

the Thyreatic plain and Argos, adopted the longer one indicated by the

mention of Orestheion. Argos was, by its strategical position, ever a

serious obstacle to Sparta’s communication with the north.

#KITHÆRON AND PARNES.#

Mardonius had, up to this time, refrained from damaging Athens and

Attica, in the hope that the Athenians would change their minds, and

accept his proposals; but, failing to persuade them to do so, and

hearing of the advance of this army to the Isthmus, he set fire to

Athens, and began to withdraw to Bœotia; “because,” says Herodotus,

“Attica was not a country for cavalry, and if he were defeated in

an engagement his only line of retreat was through strait places, so

that a few men could stop him.” He determined, therefore, to retreat,

and make Thebes his base of operations, as lying in a region eminently

adapted to the use of cavalry. His evident fear was lest the Greek

forces should work up through the Megarid and seize the difficult

passes of the Kithæron-Parnes range in his rear.

As this range is of great importance in the campaign which was at

this time about to open, it may be well to describe its nature, and

to enumerate the passes by which it is pierced. It was regarded by

the Greeks as an effective and important line of defence; and the

difficulties which it presented to various armies which had occasion

to traverse or to attempt to traverse it in the warfare of the fifth

and fourth centuries before Christ, show that their estimate of its

defensive possibilities was not a mistaken one. As its name implies, it

is in reality composed of two short ranges, Kithæron on the west, and

Parnes on the east. These are connected by an upland country known to

the ancients by the name of Panakton, whose approaches on either side

are, from a military point of view, of a very difficult character. The

chain as a whole may be said to form a continuous barrier stretching

from the head of the gulf of Corinth to the southern part of the

Euripus. Both Kithæron and Parnes are sharply-edged, steep-sided

ridges, whose highest points rise to a height of four thousand five

hundred feet above sea-level, while the general elevation of each chain

is about three thousand feet. Though not, as will be seen, of any great

height, they offer comparatively few passages. There are six points at

which the range may be traversed. Of these the western series, four in

number, are of importance in reference to the battle of Platæa itself,

while the two eastern passes afford alternative routes for an army

retreating, like that of Mardonius, from Athens to Thebes.

At the extreme west of the range, where it sinks with sudden abruptness

into the gulf of Corinth, it is turned rather than traversed by what is

little better than a mountain track, which led from the Bœotian port

of Kreusis to the Megarean town of Ægosthena. From Ægosthena a

road led southwards to Pagæ, and so round the western bastions of Mount

Geraneia to the Isthmus. It was also quite possible to reach Megara by

a branch of this route.

◆Cf. Xen. Hell. v. 4; vi. 4.◆

The difficulties of this pass are such that it was rarely used for

military purposes, and it seems to have played no part whatever in the

operations of 479.

The second pass is that which the road from Platæa to Megara formerly

traversed. It crosses Kithæron a little more than a mile eastward of

Platæa, entering a deep valley which runs into the chain from the

north, and ascending steeply from the head of the valley to the summit

of a col in the ridge. Its character forbids the supposition that it

can ever have been used for wheeled vehicles, and its importance must

have been mainly due to the fact that it is the only one of this series

of passes, with the exception of the track by Ægosthena, by which

land communication between Northern Greece and the Peloponnese could

be maintained without entering Attic territory. The road south of it,

towards Megara, traverses the troublesome hill region of the Northern

Megarid.[182] The fact that Platæa practically commanded the northern

end of this pass rendered the town one of the most important strategic

positions in Greece, both in the fifth and in the fourth centuries. It

will be hereafter seen that this pass must have played an important

part in the operations of the Greek army at Platæa.

The third pass is one by which the road from Platæa to Athens crossed

the range. It is little more than a mile to the east of that last

mentioned. Remains of the road are visible on the north side, entering

a somewhat broad valley running into the hills. It must have always

been an easy pass, and the ancient wheel-ruts worn in the rock show

that it was used by wheeled vehicles.[183] #PASSES BETWEEN ATTICA AND

BŒOTIA.# The road, after traversing it, turned east, and joined,

near Eleutheræ, the road from Thebes to Eleusis by way of the pass of

Dryoskephalæ. This pass also played an important part in the operations

at Platæa.

The fourth pass was well known under its Attic name of Dryoskephalæ,

and though not traversed by the direct road between Thebes and Athens,

must have been largely used by those going from one place to the

other, owing to the route by way of it being more easy than the direct

road by Phyle. From the Bœotian side, near the site of the ancient

Erythræ, the ascent is steep; it must have always been necessary to

make it by a series of zigzags. The summit once reached, the descent

is gradual, down a long stream-valley which abuts on a small plain of

Attica beneath the fortress of Eleutheræ. As a pass, it was probably

always more difficult than that on the Platæa-Athens road, but as the

route from Thebes through it was more direct, it became the most used

of the passes of Kithæron, and seems to have been the only one which

had a special name in ancient times. The road through it was continued

southward through a not very difficult country, as country goes in

Greece, to the Thriasian plain and Eleusis, passing by or very near the

fortress of Œne, whose importance must have been due to its position

with reference to this road. Near Eleusis it joined the Sacred Way to

Athens. Of the importance of this pass at the time of the battle of

Platæa it is hardly necessary to speak.

The fifth of the series of passes is that on the direct road between

Thebes and Athens. After ascending from the Bœotian plain to the

plateau of Panakton, it traverses the upland pastures of that region,

and enters a difficult country, where it was commanded by the important

Attic fortress of Phyle. Thence it reaches the head of the Athenian

plain. Mardonius might certainly have made use of this route for

his retreat. He preferred, however, the more roundabout way through

the sixth pass. It may have been, on the whole, an easier route.

Furthermore, Mardonius, who seems to have been more apprehensive than

he need at this moment have been that his retreat might be cut

off, evidently thought that the route furthest from the Greek lines of

advance would be safest.

The sixth pass leads from the plain of Athens into the lower basin

of the Asopos. It was commanded near its summit by that fortress of

Dekeleia which was destined to become so famous in the latter part of

the Peloponnesian war. After passing Dekeleia, it was possible, instead

of continuing along the road due north, to diverge to the left and

follow a stream-valley to Tanagra. From Tanagra there must always have

been a good, though not absolutely direct, road to Thebes, and also an

easy passage up the Asopos valley.

◆H. ix. 14.◆

Herodotus, after describing Mardonius’ preparations for leaving Athens,

says that when already on his way it was reported to him that a body of

a thousand Lacedæmonians had been pushed forward to Megara. On hearing

this, he wheeled about, and led his army as far as Megara, while his

cavalry overran the whole of the Megarid. Herodotus’ intention in

mentioning the incident is made sufficiently clear by the words which

follow: ◆H. ix. 14, ad fin.◆ “This is the furthest point west in Europe

which the Persian army reached.” ◆Paus. i. 44, 4.◆ It is to this

expedition that a tradition mentioned by Pausanias must be referred—a

tradition which preserved the record of the advance of the Medes to

Pagæ.

There is no reason to doubt that the Persian raid into the Megarid is

an historical fact, recorded by Herodotus and preserved in this chance

tradition. It is not, however, at all likely that it was made by the

whole Persian army, or that it was made at the time Herodotus mentions.

His object in relating the story is plainly indicated, and in his

desire to make his main point, he has probably not been over careful as

to exactness in date.

If Mardonius wished, as is represented by the historian, to secure

his safe passage to Bœotia, he would hardly have turned back with all

his force. Had he done so, his natural line of withdrawal would have

been by Dryoskephalæ. #MARDONIS RETREATS TO BŒOTIA.# The raid into

Megara seems to have been a cavalry reconnaissance, whose object was to

discover what the Greeks were doing at the Isthmus, and, moreover,

it was probably made several days at least before the time indicated by

Herodotus.

◆H. viii. 15.◆

The actual line of retreat Herodotus describes with some detail. He

first went to Dekeleia, whence guides despatched by the Bœotarchs

conducted him to Sphendale, and so to Tanagra. From thence he made

his way up the Asopos valley to Skolos, where he formed a stockaded

camp.[184]

It is impossible to arrive at any real comprehension of the history of

this stage of the war without deducing from the action of Mardonius the

nature of the designs, both political and strategical, which led him to

adopt the course of action which he did.

It is evident, in the first place, that he had given up all idea of an

attack on the fortifications of the Isthmus. It is also evident that

he had recognized from the first that the only possibility offered him

of an attack on that position was in the event of his winning over

Athens to his side. If he could not do so, he would be liable to have

his communications cut at any moment in the very difficult region of

the Megarid. The negotiations with Athens had conspicuously failed.

It would be absurd to suppose that he was not prepared for such an

eventuality even before he started for Thessaly; he may be conceived

even to have recognized that, after the events of the previous

year, the probability of success in the negotiation was remote.[185] If

this be the case, it is to be concluded that he had some alternative

design in his mind, which he intended to carry out in case the first

miscarried. The very circumstances under which the history of the

time was written forbade the possibility of the nature of that design

becoming known to after-ages, and the only surviving indications of

what he planned are afforded by what he did.

It is amply proved in the Greek historians that the disaster of the

previous year had left the ruling powers of the north just as loyal to

Persian interests as they had been before Salamis. If anything, their

loyalty had increased. Their contingents were with Mardonius. They had

practically staked their all on his success; and only his presence

could save them from the severe retaliation which the patriotic Greeks

might be expected to inflict on those who had joined the enemies of

their country. If Mardonius’ strategy at this time be any indication

of his policy, that policy aimed at the establishment of a new Persian

frontier at the Kithæron-Parnes line, with Thessaly, Phocis, and Bœotia

in a similar position to the vassal states of Thrace and Macedonia.